{"id":3603,"date":"2013-04-17T16:06:14","date_gmt":"2013-04-17T15:06:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/?p=3603"},"modified":"2013-04-17T16:08:09","modified_gmt":"2013-04-17T15:08:09","slug":"well-hello","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/well-hello\/","title":{"rendered":"Well Hello!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Knees<\/a><\/p>\n

It’s been a long time, hasn’t it? \u00a0Over a year, and a lot’s happened.\u00a0BUT, most excitingly I have had a breakthrough with my barefoot technique, hence this new post.<\/p>\n

I live in the Mendip Hills, so much of my running is cross-country, and I love it. \u00a0But, I work in Bristol, so inevitably I still run around the streets. \u00a0However, I was less keen on this, as the repetitive terrain always ended up with tight calves, and after the last Half Marathon this lasted for about three days. \u00a0I had put it down to the lack of variety in pace and pitch, which is partly true, but from scouting around on barefoot forums I also realised that something else was to blame – I’ve been running on my toes.<\/p>\n

Not literally, but I had taken the emphasis of forefoot running too far, and was never really bringing my heels down. \u00a0This meant that my calves were carrying too much load.<\/p>\n

From various sites I learned that I hadn’t been lifting my knees enough – when you do it lets your ankle and foot drop and your calf relax while running. I’ve also learned not to be afraid of letting my heel come down – I had misunderstood forefoot running to mean only<\/span> on the forefoot, rather than lead by the forefoot.<\/p>\n

The difference has been amazing – I can run so much further on hard, level surfaces now and don’t have the calf strain. \u00a0I can also feel my thighs working harder, which is great as these muscles are a lot bigger than your calves. \u00a0What’s most surprising though is the way that running with your knees up higher seems to propel you in a different manner – it’s almost as if you\u00a0have<\/span> to run, rather than making yourself run.<\/p>\n

Try it – you’ll see what I mean.<\/p>\n

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It’s been a long time, hasn’t it? \u00a0Over a year, and a lot’s happened.\u00a0BUT, most excitingly I have had a breakthrough with my barefoot technique, hence this new post. I live in the Mendip Hills, so much of my running is cross-country, and I love it. \u00a0But, I work in Bristol, so inevitably I still […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[6,372,15,125,276,400,310,171],"class_list":["post-3603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-barefoot-running-diaries","tag-barefoot","tag-calf","tag-calves","tag-knees","tag-strain","tag-terrain","tag-tight","tag-toes","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3603"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3603\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3614,"href":"https:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3603\/revisions\/3614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runningtrainingplan.com\/runningpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}